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Editorial Review:
The bitter enmity between Elizabeth the First and Mary Tudor, the daughters of Henry VIII (not to mention the conflict between their mothers Anne Boleyn and Katherine of Aragon) makes the squabbles between modern-day royals seem small beer indeed. This is particularly clear after reading something as enjoyable as Philippa Gregory's The Queen's Fool, which treats the period and its turbulent sweep with an almost operatic grandeur. In The Other Boleyn Girl, Gregory delivered a tremendous popular success and lifted this kind of popular historical writing from the realms of romantic fiction to something rich in authentic drama and convincing historical verisimilitude.
Mary and Elizabeth, the two young princesses, have a common goal: to be Queen of England. To achieve this, they need both to win the love of the people and learn how to negotiate dangerous political pitfalls. Gregory recreates this era with tremendous colour, and she makes the court an enticing but danger-fraught place. Into this setting comes the eponymous fool, the youthful Hannah, who (despite her air of guileless religiousness) is not naive. She soon finds herself having to deal with the beguiling but treacherous Robert Dudley. Dispatched to report on Princess Mary, Hannah discovers in her a passionate religious conviction (to return England to the rule of Rome and its pope) that will have fatal consequences.
From Tolstoy's War and Peace onwards, historical novelists have set fictitious characters among real-life personages with mixed success; the author's creations can often pale beside the historical figures. That is emphatically not the case here, and Gregory ensures that all her characters have a full and teeming life. Expect a major movie: something as colourful and exuberant as The Queen's Fool is a natural for screen adaptation. --Barry Forshaw
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.5 / 5.0
One of the best books i've read This was only the second Philippa Gregory book i'd ever read so i had no idea how it would turn out
As soon as I read the first page I was hooked - i'd never read a book so fast in my life
When I finished it I couldnt stop thinking about hannah green , about her love for Robert Dudley about her way of life.
About 3 months after id read it i couldnt stand it any longer i was so caught up in the character i struggled to read any other books so ive decided to read it again.
I cant wait... more info
Not just historical chick-lit Having previously written-off Philippa Gregory's novels as 'historical chick-lit', I decided to stop being such a snob and try one anyway. I couldn't bring myself to buy 'The Other Boleyn Girl', because the only copy I could find had Scarlett Johansson etc on the cover, so I opted for 'The Queen's Fool'. The first quarter was a little slow-moving and felt more like an unusually colourful history book than a novel, while the narrator, Hannah Green, came across as a narrative device rather than a... more info
A Fool Caught in a Very Strange Web Philippa Gregory weaves a very different tale with a completely fictional narrator, young Hannah Green. As other reviews have noted, Hannah and her father flee the Spanish Inquisition, and start a new life in London, where she is discovered as having the gift of "Sight" by none other than Robert Dudley, who presses her first into service for the young King, thus beginning of a life of courtly intrigue. As always, Gregory writes compellingly and interestingly, and I kept turning the pages because I... more info
The Queen's Fool - a review As I read 'The Other Bolyn Girl' I felt that Mary was my friend. As I read 'The Queen's Fool' I felt that I really got to know Hannah as well. It takes a very good writer to achieve this effectively and Philippa Gregory is a marvel at it. I really liked 'The Other Bolyn Girl' but what I liked about 'The Queen's Fool' is that it was different. Yet it still gave a wonderful insight into Tudor Court and Tudor life (as seen through the eyes of Philippa Gregory admittedly) and was a thoroughly enjoyable and... more info
